He Kept Postponing Our Marriage for Her Crises… So I Ended It Myself Chapter 02
“Lost your mind?” He caught my chin between his fingers, tilting my face up. “Nobody in this room knows how to scheme better than you.”
I held his gaze. I didn’t say a word, didn’t argue.
My mind drifted, the way it always did when I had nothing left to say, back to the Crawford house, back to the years I spent afraid of my own shadow.
Chloe and I were both charity cases, girls from nothing, adopted by the Crawfords.
Our job was to keep their real daughter, Stella Crawford, company. Study partners, built-in friends, whatever she wanted.
They dressed us well and fed us well, but strip that away and we were house pets.
Mrs. Crawford liked making us compete. She pitted us against each other for scraps of her approval.
She’d buy one dress for the two of us.
Sign us up for summer camp, but only pay for one spot.
Every time, Chloe pulled rank. She’d been there first, so she got first pick.
And I just stepped back.
I stepped aside for her for four years. Five. Ten.
I backed down so many times I nearly forgot I was allowed to want things.
Until Stella died.
The Crawfords needed one of us to keep Julian engaged while he was young. The Sterling family had already lost most of their money by then.
Chloe was wrapped up in Nathaniel Brooks at the time and wanted nothing to do with it. So I was offered up as a placeholder.
We started out as strangers. We didn’t stay that way.
He used to climb the wall into the Crawfords’ backyard at midnight, just to talk to me.
He’d take my hand in front of everyone and say, “She’s mine.”
I thought I was the luckiest woman alive.
Until word got out around Baycrest that Nathaniel was gay.
Just like that, Chloe came circling back, claiming I’d stolen her childhood sweetheart.
She was nothing like me.
She had a temper. She knew how to cry pretty, coax, and throw things.
She could look up at him with tears pooling in her eyes and whisper, “Julian, are you giving up on me?”
She could swallow a sob and say, “I was supposed to be the one promised to him.”
And me? The Crawfords had trained every sharp edge out of me.
All I could say was, “Julian, I respect your choice.”
But he chose me anyway, the one who never fought for anything.
Back then, that meant everything to me.
I always knew the Crawfords didn’t take us in out of kindness.
All I wanted was to pay off whatever I owed them and walk away free.
Sure enough, when it came time to actually finalize the marriages, Mrs. Crawford decided to shuffle the board.
Mrs. Crawford made a show of having us draw straws, but the whole thing was rigged. My officially designated match was now Nathaniel’s father. Chloe’s was Julian.
Because Julian and I had fallen for each other, and Mrs. Crawford saw real feelings as a liability to her control over us.
But Chloe, always suspicious, was convinced my straw still had Julian’s name on it. The second I looked away, she swapped our straws. She walked into her marriage with Nathaniel’s father thinking she’d outsmarted everyone and hit the jackpot.
And I, by some twist of fate, ended up with Julian.
But in Julian’s version of the story, I was the one who’d rigged the straws and stolen what was meant to be Chloe’s.
…
Julian didn’t like whatever he saw on my face.
He let go of my chin and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Audrey, I don’t want to fight about this. One month. Take care of her and call it your penance. After you turn yourself in and serve your time, we’re even.”
I scoffed and turned to walk away.
He caught my wrist and yanked me back. My back hit his chest.
His arm locked around my waist, and his voice dropped to something barely above a whisper. “Did I say you could go?”
“Let go of me…”
Something shifted behind his eyes. “Think very carefully. You walk out that door today, and by tomorrow morning, everyone in Baycrest will know exactly what your brother’s been doing.”
Every muscle in my body locked.
My fists clenched so hard my knuckles ached.
He straightened up. His thumb brushed my lower lip, and just like that, his voice went soft.
“Be good for me. One month. It’ll be over before you know it.”
I stopped fighting him.
I got down on my knees and started picking up the shards, piece by piece.
Chloe clapped from the sofa, laughing. “She’s on her knees! She’s on her knees!”
Julian glanced at me once, scooped Chloe up, and headed for the stairs.
“Julian, there are scary noises in the basement… Chloe’s so scared. Can the mean lady sleep down there tonight? Please?”
Julian didn’t answer.
He shifted her weight in his arms and kept climbing. That was answer enough.
My stomach dropped.
“The basement is too damp. I’m… I can’t…”
He cut me off, his voice like a wall of ice.
“Chloe might never recover. Ever. You’re sleeping in the basement for one night. You’ll survive.”
I swallowed the rest of the sentence.
I wiped my eyes. Breathed in.
One month.
He could only do this for one month.
I pulled out my phone and texted Arthur.
[Arthur, we talked about this. Move it up. As fast as you can.]
